NEW YORK--Grammy-winning R&B singer Rihanna said she once felt she was strong enough to take back boyfriend Chris Brown after he famously assaulted her in 2009, but finally realized she had been stupid to think that way. "I was very protective of him. I felt that people didn't understand him," she told Vanity Fair magazine in a cover story for the November issue. Explaining why she took him back after he left her bloodied on the eve of the Grammy awards, Rihanna, 27, said she thought "Maybe I'm one of those people built to handle ... this. "Maybe I'm the person who's almost the guardian angel to this person, to be there when they're not strong enough" and to be able to "say the right thing." But the singer, actress and designer who has become one of the best-selling musical acts of the past decade said she "finally had to say, 'Uh-oh, I was stupid thinking I was built for this.' Sometimes you just have to walk away." "I don't hate him," Rihanna said, adding "I will care about him until the day I die. We're not friends, but it's not like we're enemies." Rihanna also weighed in on fame and her status as a pop cultural icon in the interview, as well as some controversial topics such as Rachel Dolezal, the white NAACP executive who claimed to be black and resigned her post earlier this year. "I think she was a bit of a hero," she said. "She kind of flipped on society a little bit. Is it such a horrible thing that she pretended to be black? Black is a great thing, and I think she legit changed people's perspective a bit and woke people up." Of her mega-fame, the Puma creative director, "The Voice" mentor and fashion icon said sometimes it's way too scary and unrealistic. "It's the thing I fear the most: to be swallowed up by that bubble. It can be poison to you, fame." "I literally dream about buying my own groceries ... Because it is something that is real and normal." And she laughed off her reputation for hard-partying ways: "I've been thinking lately about how boring I am," Rihanna said. "When I do get time to myself, I watch TV."